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New 3x3 snow volleyball format established in bid to gain Winter Olympic inclusion

A new 3x3 snow volleyball format has been approved by the European Volleyball Confederation (CEV) to try and increase the chance of the sport entering the Winter Olympics, according to CEV President Alexander Boricic.

In March this year, Austria hosted the first ever European Snow Volleyball Championship which was won by Russia, while the sport featured at the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympics at an exhibition event.

"I want to congratulate Russia on the fact that it was her team that achieved the historic result - they won the first gold of the European Championship in snow volleyball," Boricic told Russia's state news agency TASS.

"It's wonderful that now we have three disciplines: classic volleyball with teams of six volleyball players on the court, beach volleyball, consisting of two players, and snow volleyball, in which teams of three athletes will now play on the site.

Boricic explained the 3x3 format was chosen after 3x3 basketball made it onto the programme for the Summer Olympic Games at Tokyo 2020.

"We want to achieve the same with snow volleyball so that it becomes a candidate for inclusion in the programme of the Winter Olympic Games," he said.

The exhibition event at Pyeongchang featured stars of both the classic and beach formats, including Olympic champion Vladimir Grbich from Serbia and three-time Olympic medallist Emanuel Rego from Brazil.

About the author

Prior to joining insidethegames.biz in June 2018, James worked as a broadcast journalist at Celador Radio in Bristol, where he read the drivetime news across seven stations in the South West of England. He graduated from the University of Exeter in 2016 with a 2:1 in History, before completing a Masters in Broadcast Journalism at Salford University. James’ passion lies in sport. He has a golf handicap of nine, is a qualified windsurfing instructor, regularly plays hockey and tennis and has previously competed in the long jump at a national level. His first trip with insidethegames.biz was to cover IOC Executive Board meetings in Lausanne, while he has since covered the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta and Palembang.

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Fact of the day

At the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Iranian judoka Arash Miresmaeili was disqualified for weighing in at nearly four pounds above the limit for his weight class of his under-66 kilograms match against an Israeli opponent Ehud Vaks in the first round. It was claimed Miresmaeili had gone on an eating binge to protest the International Olympic Committee's recognition of the state of Israel. Iran does not recognise the state of Israel, and Miresmaeili's actions won praise from high-ranking Iranian officials. Mohammad Khatami, the country's President at the time, was quoted as saying Miresmaili's actions would be "recorded in the history of Iranian glories". He was later awarded $125,000 by the Government - the same amount given to Olympic gold medallists.

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